Disability Rights

Solitary Confinement in Ohio Prisons

05.10.17

Disability Rights Ohio and the ACLU of Ohio are continuing to work for out-of-cell time for programming and other activities. Ending solitary confinement is a disability rights issue since people with disabilities are more likely to be put in solitary, and because psychological damage from solitary confinement can occur after days.

Updated 11.28.16: Over 500 Ohioans wrote to Ohio’s prisons director, Gary Mohr, demanding expansive reforms to Ohio’s use of solitary confinement, and protections for people with mental illness who are particularly vulnerable to its destructive impact. Thanks to your advocacy, the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) has been removing individuals with serious mental illnesses from solitary confinement, and has continued to depopulate the most extreme levels of solitary confinement.

The ACLU of Ohio will continue working with Disability Rights Ohio to ensure that ODRC institutes further reforms and adopts formal policies that keep people with a mental illness of any kind out of solitary confinement.

04.06.15

Ohio is putting people in solitary confinement. Although the state doesn’t call it that.

In reality, it doesn’t matter what name is used. Whether it’s local control, disciplinary control, administrative segregation, or restrictive housing, it’s extreme isolation.